Germ Warrior Acid Trip

GERM WARRIOR ACID TRIP
Some food for thought to those who cannot comprehend how our
government could possibly do something so crazy as to
spark an epidemic:
I noticed an interesting tidbit in the October issue of "George"
magazine- an article dealing with the mysterious death of Frank
Olson, a scientist who was used as a human guinea pig,
unwittingly slipped LSD as part of a mind-control experiment in
1953.
In the weeks following the experiment, Olson experienced
personality changes and became depressed. He died
after falling 10 floors from the Statler Hotel in Manhattan,
ruled a suicide.
This episode is generally accepted, not "conspiracy theory" -
President Gerald Ford issued an apology for the incident in
1975, long before apologies became fashionable, not that
apologies are ever in fashion for right-wing Republicans.
Congress also passed a bill awarding $750,000 to Olson's
family, as compensation.
I had long known this basic story about Olson, but one fact
that had slipped my notice: Olson was a civilian army
"germ warrior", working at Fort Detrick to develop lethal
viruses and toxins for military use.
Think about that for a minute: Typhoid Mary managed to
start an epidemic by herself, and she wasn't even a
microbiologist. Think what a germ warfare scientist,
paranoid and delusional from LSD, could do.
Of course, I'm not suggesting that Olson had anything
to do with AIDS- this is too far back in history. But it
is very relevant, because it is an example of the
characteristic, sheer insanity, that could have lead to
disastrous consequences.
This was not an isolated incident. In case you do not
realize, the CIA was probably responsible for LSD
later becoming a drug fad in the 1960s.
The CIA did not seem to realize the full dangers of LSD.
Sometimes, CIA employees allegedly slipped LSD to each
other merely as a joke.
Too responsible to start an epidemic? How responsible
was it to slip LSD to a scientist at Fort Detrick, the very
institution which is at the heart of suspicions concerning
a manmade origin of AIDS?
The CIA's messing with LSD, dating all the way back to
1950s, the supposedly "innocent" days of Donna Reed
and the Beaver, led to tragic consequences, decades later.
It may well be that the germ warfare experiments, also dating
back as early as the 1950s, led to tragic consequences,
decades later.
Tom Keske
Boston, Mass.